Over at Craig's Blog

Perhapablog

Friday, July 18, 2008

our pal, kelly!

okay...

with perhapanauts 3 finally out on the stands (and this time i'm told it's everywhere...!) and everybody's had a chance to read it, it's time to sing the praises of our fine guest artists and colorists!

first on the hit list is our old pal, kelly yates! now i refer to a lot of people as "my pal" and "our pal" and yadda yadda, but the truth is, people are just so darn friendly in this business! we're all going through the similar--and often lonely--experience of sitting at home in our tiny little studios or offices, writing or drawing our hearts out and dreaming, hoping, praying, that someone out there will like it. you meet at conventions, have a chat at your booth or table, or a drink later at the hotel bar, and, presto! you're friends!mike introduced my to kelly...what, kel, 10, 11 years ago...? at a show in detroit. mike said that kelly was a great artist. i wondered why he wasn't a male model, he was so pretty. mike told me that kelly had a great portfolio, but that, while the editors he showed it to liked his stuff, they just weren't giving him any work. i told him it was 'cause they were intimidated and felt threatened--he was just so pretty.anyway, kelly eventually did get work, doing a couple projects at dc (and even did a gorgeous serra story with me in tales of tellos #1!) and done a lot of work in advertising and licensing. you've seen his stuff all over the place, you just don't know it!

not only did kelly and his lovely wife, leanne, just welcome a little baby into the family--their first, isaac!--but kelly will soon be publishing his own creator-owned title through image called AMBER ATOMS! (see, kelly's smart and realized that the best way to do that would be to have the whole thing finished before he began publishing it, that way an issue will never be late.)

anyway, when it came time to share some of our perhapa-gang with any of our friends, kelly's name was top of the list! we love him and we love his stuff and he did such a wonderfully fantastic job with this romantic little fairy story! i really wanted this story to be something special, to capture a certain atmosphere and energy, and kelly nailed it in every panel! thanks so much, kel! enjoy san diego!

you can see a whole lot more of kelly's work at

www.kellyyatesart.com

but here's a few samples i stole from there to whet your whistle...

and here are a couple of the great tellos pages kelly did

baltimore, 2007--i told kelly to give me a pose and he went for the superman about to blast me with heat vision...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

and here are the answers to the"five for friday"i'll make a list of 3and you tell me whator who they havein common...

1. eldorado, a new world record, out of the blue

electric light orchestra ELO

2. ink, beak, tentacle

an octopus

3. bill and ted, hectic planet, milk and cheese

evan dorkin

4. john goodman, mark addy, alan reed

fred flintstone

5. let it bleed, good fellas, the departed

gimme shelter by the rolling stones(one of the most powerful and compelling songs in rock and roll history! and scorcese knows how to use it!)

9 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Hey Todd, Loved all 3 stories of this issue.

I enjoyed all the guest artists (of course I always enjoy seeing C!'s work). The pin-up by Reilly and the reverse cover by Stones were a nice touch. The "totally does not happen in this issue" on that back cover was very funny.

Congrats to Kelly and his wife on the new addition to their family.I'll also be looking forward to the Amber Atoms series.

looking back @ the 5er, I probably could've figured out the octopus (or squid?) answer, but my head was crammed with a lot of noise on Friday.

congrats to kelly and the missus on the baby. i loved his story in the tellos book with you and his back-up was some sweet stuff. he wasn't around at his section with you guys the few times i was there at baltimore or if he was i somehow missed him.

Wow, Todd! How much do I owe you for an introduction like that? I appreciate all the kind words, although I'm a little disturbed by how many pictures you have of me.

Mike Wieringo did indeed introduced us at the Detroit Motor City Con, so I guess we have known each other for the better part of 10 or 11 years. I can't believe that!

It was awesome being included in issue 3 of Perhapanauts with my "old pals" Todd & Craig and my "new pals" Dean Trippe and Jason Horn. Great colors guys! I hope everyone enjoyed reading the "Merrow's Tale" story as much as I enjoyed illustrating it. Although I was a little nervous that I wasn't going to meet the deadline, since it was a few days before Isaac's due date. I finished it, but "whew"! Also, I don't know if anybody noticed, but Craig and I were the artists on that Tales of Tellos #1.

Kelly, congratulations on the baby and the book. That's all great news. I can't wait to read Amber Atoms. I've seen pages from it over the past few conventions and I think it's fantastic. And great job on the Merrow's tale. That looked great. Good luck in San Diego.